


Eight Nights of Drabbles

by crossingwinter



Series: Irresponsible Storytelling [17]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cersei/Jaime (v short so I'm not putting it in the main tags), Gen, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-17
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-01 20:13:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 4,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2786198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crossingwinter/pseuds/crossingwinter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I am writing a <strike>vaguely</strike> hannukah themed drabble for the duration of the holiday.  Themes might (or might not) include: fire, miracles, donuts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hot Pie

Arya calls him in the middle of the day on a Wednesday.

"Can I ask a favor?" 

"Of course," Hot Pie says, his phone couched between his shoulder and his ear as he brushes confectioner’s sugar off his hands. "What’s up?"

"So, I’ve been doing this big-sister mentor program, yeah?" Arya says slowly. Hot Pie scrunches his forehead. He thinks he remembers Arya saying something about that? She and Gendry had signed up together, and he and Lommy had felt bad that they just hadn’t had the time. 

"Right?"

"Well, my mentee, she’s…she’s having a rough time at home. And I was thinking it might be fun to…to bring round to yours and you could show her how you make things. If that’s all right, of course."

Which was how he ended up with the three of them, Arya, Gendry, and a little girl with watery eyes that Arya called Weasel, in his kitchen on Sunday morning. 

"This is…"

"I…"

"Hot Pie—this is the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life."

Hot Pie smiles at them happily crossing his arms over his chest with pride. ”You see? It makes a difference, those tea towels.”

"Can I have another?" Weasel asks, and the joy in her eyes makes Hot Pie smile, and Arya sees it too and beams at him. 

"Of course," Hot Pie says at the same time that Arya moves the plate of doughnuts towards the girl. She grabs another and begins munching, closing her eyes happily. Arya shoots him an expression that reads thanks more profoundly than any words. 

"Nothing like a good doughnut to make you realize just how crappy Dunkin Donuts is," Gendry sighs. He grabs another doughnut from the plate in front of Weasel. "Hot Pie, you really should open a bakery. You’d be famous. Like that guy who invented cronuts."

"It’s not about fame," says Hot Pie, suddenly feeling very warm. It isn’t after all. It’s about seeing your friends smile when they put home-made treats into their mouths and it’s better than anything they could buy anywhere else. He couldn’t buy that. He certainly couldn’t sell it.

"Yeah—but you still could,” Gendry insists, and he takes another bite, and groans. ”Holy fu—” he begins and Arya elbows him and jerks her head in Weasel’s direction. Weasel is still munching on her doughnut. ”…dgesicles that tastes amazing,”

"Can you make fudgesicles?" Weasel asks, her voice so high pitched compared to Gendry’s. 

Hot Pie smiles down at her. ”For you, I can. How about next week. When do you see Arya next?”

Weasel turns and looks up at Arya, who grins. ”Pick a day, Hot Pie. We’ll be there.”

"Wednesday?"

"Perfect," Weasel says, and she reaches for another doughnut.


	2. Melisandre

The flames told her that there would be darkness—a darkness to last a thousand years or more, cold and black and stormy. The snow clouds would cover the moon, cover the sun, and even the bright white snow would have nothing but blackness to reflect.

The flames gave her warning, that a shadow like the shadow of home would crawl across the world, and that, as the dragons had died, so too would man and horse and dog and aurochs. There would be nothing but ice and black, no love or laughter or light, and soon there would be no flame, either, for what would there be left to burn in such a wasteland?

The flames also showed her a star—a bleeding star with a red tail sailing across the sky. It showed her a king, and it showed her a sword that burned through the night—a brilliant needle on black silk. The flames showed her skulls, and death, and men and women starving, but mostly it just showed her snow—snow and snow and snow and maybe, maybe on a good day, a hint of the dawn.


	3. Highgarden Burns

They fall upon Highgarden under cover of night.  _Do you see the stars? It is a sign of our victory. The Stars shall fall on Highgarden tonight._  It is an exciting thought to him. In all his years, never had he known such a victory. Highgarden. They shall take it, and forever be known as the ones who did, their names will go down in history.

Samwell looks to his brother. Davos sits tall on his horse, one hand resting on the grip of his saddle, the other on Dawn’s pummel, almost lazily. His eyes are fixed on the castle, on its wide gardens and the trees that line the pathways towards the main gates. The air is sweet with the scent of roses.

“Brother?” Samwell asks, and Davos looks at him.

“Ser Qyle,” Davos calls, and Qyle kicks his horse forward.

“Your Grace?”

Davos turns back towards Highgarden, and there is almost a hint of glee to his voice as he says. “Burn the gardens. Samwell—with me.”

Samwell kicks Nightfall forward and he and his brother lead their host along the pathway towards the garden.

Highgarden is a beautiful castle—that much is true. And though it sits atop a hill, such high ground is not enough for men of the mountains, and the slope is gentle, easy—hardly strategic for war. Their host takes the main gate with ease, killing the men who guard it before they can sound the alarm, before they press on to the gate of the next ringwall. It is easy—almost too easy.

“Remind me not to live so old as Garth,” Davos says, “Lest I ever put fools at the gates of Starfall.”

“I will not wish death upon you, brother,” Samwell responds stoutly. He could never—not his brother. They had climbed the cliffs together since they were children, and it had been his own brother who had arranged a marriage to the lady of High Hermitage, though she had proclaimed she would take no husband and that her family’s line would die with her. Davos always got what he wanted, though. He was charming, and forceful in a way that Samwell was not, and after a single dinner with Lady Obelle, he had come back with a bride for his brother.

Davos looked at him askance. “You will not be wishing me death—you will be wishing me life. This—” he gestures back towards the slain guardsmen. “This is not life. Sinility is not life. It is endurance. I’d sooner live. Come on.” And he moves Starrise back into motion and they push into the castle.

The main hall is empty, and Davos smiles. “How cruel shall I be?” he asks Samwell.

“Brother?”

Davos’ eyes are on the Oakenseat, the living throne from which the Gardner kings ruled their domain. It is a vast thing, of gnarled brown wood, and Davos rides his horse right up onto the dais staring at it, and his face is cruel.  _He always was harsh to others,_  Samwell thinks. Never to me.  _But to others…_

Davos unsheathes Dawn and raises it high above his head, then he brings it down, hard onto the Oakenseat. A crack fills the room, and he raises the greatsword again, and strikes. Before long, the throne has been slashed to pieces, and lies in wooden chips on the dais. While Davos hacked, Starrise had let fall a pile of manure and when Davos sheathes Dawn again, he smirks at it before he rides down from the dais.

“Burn it,” he commands Yorick, who nods. Then Davos turns to Samwell. “Let’s find old Garth, shall we? Put the poor man out of his misery.”

When they emerge into the lichyard, Samwell hears shouts of panic. “Fire! Fire! The gardens are on fire!”

“Going the wrong way,” Davos chuckles under his breath, watching as men of Highgarden run out to the gardens, some of them only half-dressed, others carrying buckets of water—as though that would be enough to quench the flames. The gardens are vast—even if they could divert the Mander, it might not be enough to end the conflagration.

They find Garth X, King of the Reach, tied naked to his bed. His skin hangs loosely on his bones, spotted from drink and wrinkled with age, his hair tangled and—Samwell feels a surge of pity for the man. He is lying in his own shit.

Davos raises his eyebrows. “Your Grace.” Davos bows slightly.

“What?” Garth babbles, “What? Where is Manderly? Where has he gone? I’ll teach him to treat his goodfather this way! He’ll know the rage of Highgarden! He will!” His own goodson had done this to him? He had known that the lord of the Reach fought amongst themselves, that Manderly and Peake vied for power, and that Old Garth had been swayed constantly back and forth by the two lords to whom he’d given his daughters. But to have them do this to him…what had Lord Manderly done? Had he threatened his king? If you do not make me your heir, I shall destroy you? Surely no man would be so insubordinate, so disrespectful? It would have been better to have killed the king and have done with it than leave him like this…

 _No wonder there was no resistance at the gates,_  Samwell thinks suddenly. _Manderly was here. Manderly had already lowered the defenses. Is he playing us? Hoping we’ll—_

Davos is bending down next to Garth, and the harshness of his expression is gone completely. “No man deserves to live like this,” he says sadly.

“No man!” Garth babbles. “No man should live like this. I want—I want—I want…” but what he wanted, Samwell never learned, for Davos’s knife slides across his throat and a gush of red spills across his chest.

“Davos—” Samwell begins, but Davos shakes his head.

“It’s a mercy, Samwell. No man should live like that. Do not let me live this long.” He wipes his blade on the King’s bedspread and tucks it back into his belt. He stands straighter and turns to the door of the bedroom, and a moment later, his brother’s voice thunders through the castle. “Set it to the torch!”


	4. Sansa x Edric

It’s the fourth day of the blackout and Sansa has run through her candles. She’d burned through the tea candles that were left-over from the night that Arya had proposed to Gendry, the long ones that she saved for dinner parties, and, last night, she’d finished the last of the peach scented things that she had sworn she’d only ever use if she was having sex. 

The power grids were down—but, worse than that—no one had any idea why, or how, and the backup power in the city was going to Blessed Baelor’s hospital. Things had been eerily quiet. There were no snippits of music emitting from the open windows, no pounding basslines from clubs at two in the morning. Even the sound of a car was rare.

The sun was setting, and long purple shadows were making their way across her apartment and, in the window that sat caddy-corner to her own bedroom, her neighbor was lighting a candle.

She’d seen him before. A few times in the morning when they bumped into one another by the elevator, or when he was lugging huge bags of kitty litter up the stairs because no one trusted the elevator to lift heavy loads. She’d seen him shirtless through the window once or twice as well, and had always been careful to close her curtains, because his bedroom window was very close to hers.

She stares at the light for a moment, that single tiny flame in the window only a few feet away and she reaches down and twists a loose thread on her bedspread.

Then she goes. She stumbles her way through her dark apartment, grabbing her keys from the hook by the door and stepping out onto the dark landing. She knocks firmly on the door and waits, holding her breath.

“Who is it?” His voice isn’t precisely apprehensive, but it certainly is a little more wary than she’s heard it during their ritual “good morning!”s. 

“Sansa Stark. In 5—” she hears the sound of a lock crunching, “D.”

“Hello,” he says and she can’t quite see his face in the darkness, and she’s sure he can’t see hers either.

“I was wondering…I don’t suppose you have any leftover candles, do you? I ran through mine…”

It sounds like he’s grinning when he replies. “You want some of my carefully guarded stash?”

She blushes. “Well—I’d get you a replacement when…when the blackout’s over.”

“I’m teasing. Come on in, I’ll find you one.”

She follows him into the apartment. He makes his way through with ease, even in the dark.

“I’m not taking your last one, am I?” Sansa asks when he opens a cupboard in the kitchen.

“Nah. My aunt went nuts when she heard about the outage and sent me like forty boxes worth. She does that,” he says

Sansa smiles. “Don’t say that. You’re tempting fate, and that’ll make this blackout go on for. “If anything, you want like twenty candles? I will never use them all.”ever.” 

“True. I didn’t mean it, gods. Please do not make this go on forever,” he raises his voice to the heavens and Sansa feels her smile widen even more.

A moment later, there’s a spark of a match, and he lights the end of a candle, and hands it to her. He’s very handsome, in light like that, the gentle gold of the candle softening his features and making his blue eyes sparkle, almost purple, in the darkness. “For you, Sansa.”

“Thank you…?”

“Ned. Ned Dayne.” She feels her breath stop for a moment. It’s silly—silly that she’d get excited over a name. Just because he’s got the same name as her father…but she isn’t going to think about that now. Father’s dead, he’s been gone for years and even if she wishes he weren’t, he can never come back. 

“Thank you, Ned.” She sounds breathless. Neither of them move. Neither of them say anything at all. And then, Sansa stands on the tips of her toes, and kisses his cheek.


	5. Sandor

He used to stare at it—the fire.  He stared at it and stared at it and stared at it and willed his heart not to beat a little faster, willed himself not to taste the bitter sting in his saliva, willed himself not to sweat, and wince, and feel Gregor’s fingers on the good side of his face.

His father had always said he’d had a strong will, that he’d been raised well and honorable and that he knew right from wrong.  But when it comes to willing himself—not to forget because fuck he’ll never forget doesn’t want to forget, but willing himself not to feel his brother’s fucking fingers on his fucking face, he can’t do it. 

It doesn’t matter if the flames are red and orange and yellow, or if they’re green and white and making the night feel like a fucking nightmare—he feels Gregor’s fingers on his face, and the crackle of the fire sounds like his grunting in Sandor’s ears.

Somewhere, though, along the way, it stops feeling like Gregor.  Not completely, anyway.  He isn’t sure when—maybe it’s when he’s trying to get the feral little bitch back to her family, or maybe it’s when Dondarrion sets his sword on fire and it’s a little different than it was before.  He’s not sure.  He’s not sure he wants to be sure.  But now the flame doesn’t sound like Gregor anymore, even if he still feels his fingers, it sounds like that little bird and the song he’d made her sing. 

It’s almost worse, actually.  At least when it’s Gregor in his ears and not  _her_  he doesn’t feel like he did anything wrong, but he’d put that fucking knife to her throat and her voice had been trembling when she’d sang.  He doesn’t want to be reminded of  _that_  whenever he warms himself alongside his newest brothers, but he’s never been able to will himself to keep his mind blank when staring at the flames.


	6. Cersei x Jaime

He likes the way she looks by candlelight—the way her golden hair seems to glow. When does golden hair glow, these days, as incandescent lightbulbs slowly are replaced by greener options that make everything seem pale and almost blue? Cersei’s hair should glow gold always and it does in the candlelight.


	7. Beric

_Could you bring back a man without a head?_

In his dreams now, he is headless.  Or rather, he dreams that his head is not his head.  It is fire.  It is flesh.  But it is not him.  None of him is him anymore.  

He’s not sure what he is anymore.  Not sure who he is.  He acts as if he does, but this life isn’t a full life, because every time he dies he forgets a little more.

He hadn’t realized how much you forget.  He hadn’t realized how much forgetting is like death, for what lived if you can’t remember it  Can it live if you don’t remember it?  Did it ever exist at all?  Did he ever exist at all—he—Beric Dondarrion?  Or has he always been someone else?  Is he someone else now

Will he be someone else the next time?

_Are you my mother, Thoros?_

He can’t remember his mother’s face.  Some nights he can’t remember even her name.  He remembers his own name only barely, and can’t remember if he was named for his father, or for an uncle, or perhaps someone else.  

He’s heard women say that the first moments of a babe’s life, the first moments when it sees its mother are the most important moments of his life.  And whenever he opens his eye again, it is Thoros he sees, concerned, nervous, excited.  That’s what a mother is when she first holds her child, isn’t she?  

He wonders if Thoros feels guilty—that he’s consigned his child to a life half-remembered, half-lived.  He knows, at least, that Thoros cares for him.

It is good to be cared for.

He does not know if he even cares for himself anymore.


	8. On the Eighth Night (Starks)

"I call innermost on the left."

“ _I_ was going to call innermost on the left,” Rickon whined.

"Too bad, I called it," said Robb, reaching over and rubbing his little brother’s head.

"But you always win and this is the first night we all get to go," Rickon pouted. 

"Robb," Mother intoned, and Robb gaped at her.

"But I called it."

"Calling doesn’t mean anything, Robb. If it were, I would call the shamash every time and win. It is diplomacy," Sansa said, fiddling with the end of her braid. Robb rolled his eyes at her.

"Oh please. This isn’t about diplomacy. It’s about winning."

"While you are debating that point, can I have the third from the right?" Arya demanded. 

"Second from the right," Jon called.

Rickon was right, Bran thought. It  _was_  the first night that they had all been able to pick a candle. The past two nights, one of their parents had sat out, and before then, they had had to break into teams. But tonight was the last night, and there were eight of them and eight candles, and it would be down to luck and strategy to see which would burn out the fastest. 

"Sansa’s candle is tilted. It’ll burn too fast," Arya pointed out.

"It is not," Sansa retorted.

"Liar."

But Father was adjusting the candle in question. “Anything else? Or can we light up?”

Everyone shook their heads, and Mother reached over and turned off the light switch while Father lit the shamash for Rickon, then helped him light each candle in turn.

They said their prayer the sat in silence for a few minutes, watching as the nine glowed hot in the dark.

"How long will it be?" Rickon asked, breaking the silence.

"Ten minutes? Twenty?" Bran said. Rickon shifted in his seat. 

"I thought it would go faster since there are more of them tonight," he complained.

"Nope," Arya said, "but it’s ok. It’ll be fun."

Rickon stared at the menorah scrunching up his face. “I want to win,” he said forcefully.

Jon and Robb both laughed. “Don’t we all,” Robb said.

"But you’ve won three times and I haven’t won any," Rickon said loudly.

"Luck and strategy," shrugged Robb. Jon elbowed him and muttered something, and Robb doubled over laughing, his kippah falling off.

"Yes?" Mother said.

"Nothing, Mother," Robb muttered, bending down and grabbing his kippah. It was a new one, one that Sansa had made him for her bat mitzvah. She had made them all new kippot with a crocheting pattern that she had found online, and had even made herself a lacy head covering with a bird pattern on it. Bran liked the kippah. He liked wearing it to Hebrew School especially because it was much nicer than everyone else’s kippot. No one else had home-made ones. 

Across the room, they heard the sound of their father’s phone dinging with some new message, and Father rolled his eyes. “Forgot to turn it on silent,” he muttered, getting to his feet and going to his phone.

"Ned, leave it," Mother called after him.

"Just making sure that Lannister doesn’t keep bothering me. If he keeps texting, it will ruin the night."

"Did he like the gelt you brought him?" asked Jon.

"He made no comment," Father replied, coming and sitting down. "I think he couldn’t tell if it was a joke."

"Why would he think it’s a joke?" asked Bran. Who thought gelt was a joke? It was chocolate.

Father sighed. “Probably finds the concept of chocolate wrapped in gold offensive. A reference to the whole…” he cast Rickon a look and clearly adjusted what he was about to say, “‘Tywin Lannister poops money’ thing.” Rickon laughed. He was still young enough to find it funny every time it was mentioned. Robb smirked and whispered something in Jon’s ear. A grin spread across Jon’s face and Arya elbowed him pointedly and he bent to tell her.

"Well," said Mother, "If Tywin Lannister can’t pull that stick out of his butt long enough to enjoy some chocolate, he doesn’t deserve it."

"Precisely," agreed Father, and he settled down next to Bran. "Oh darn. I am losing." He was. His candle was still standing head and shoulders above the two on either side of it, and he sighed. "Ahh well. Better luck next year I suppose."

Jon had stopped watching the candles. His candle, like Father’s, was burning slowly and he was now occupying himself by running his hands through Arya’s hair and maxing it stand on end in funny directions while Arya told him loudly about her new kindergarten buddy who had made her a Christmas card shaped like a Christmas tree.

"Are you trying to make Arya’s hair look like a Christmas tree? Is this some sort of interpretive illustration?" Father asked, and both of them grinned.

"She is a work of art," Jon replied somberly and Arya elbowed him again. 

"Did you make Weasel a Christmas card?" asked Sansa.

Arya shook her head. “No, I made her a paper dreidel and taught her how to play. It was fun. She’d never played before.”

"You should bring her a real one next week," Mother suggested, "We have a million and a half left from Sansa’s bat mitzvah."

Arya nodded happily. “And some gelt?” she hinted.

"Are you allowed to bring chocolate to kindergarteners?"

"Probably," Arya said at the same time Sansa said, "Probably not."

No one was watching the candles—no one except Bran and Rickon. Rickon’s eyes were wide and determined. His candle was neck and neck with Robb’s, and I’d he won, he would get first spin when they turned to dreidel after the candles finished burning.  “Come on,” he was muttering to himself. “Come on, come on, come on.”

Robb laughed. “Wishing will not make it so, Rickon.”

Rickon glared at him.

"Leave him be, Robb," said Bran. Robb shrugged and turned back to Jon.

"I want to win," Rickon mumbled to Bran.

"I know," Bran said. "And you might. Look how close yours is to being done."

"No one else seems to care if they win," Rickon said. He suddenly seemed very small. It was often easy to forget how small he was. He was so loud and full of energy all the time, running through the house at top speed, but now, seated between Bran and Arya, he seemed tiny. "Why doesn’t anyone else care?"

"Because it’s just a game," Robb said.

"Robb!"

"What! It is!"

"I don’t know," Bran whispered to Rickon while Father told Robb not to ruin his brothers’ fun. "But it doesn’t matter what they think, so long as you are playing."

"But it’s not fair if they don’t care and still win," Rickon said.

Bran hummed noncommitally and looked back at the menorah. His candle was still too tall to be close to winning, and so he gave up, but Rickon’s.  _Let Rickon win,_  he thought staring at the candles. Rickon’s and Robb’s were both so close to guttering out.  _Let him win. He never does, and he really wants to._

And, a moment later, Rickon let out a triumphant “HA!” and jumped to his feet in celebration.  There was a thin stream of smoke rising from a pool of wax above where his candle had just gone out.

"I win! I win I win I win!"

"Well chosen," grinned Bran, and Rickon gave him a hug at the same time that Sansa said, "Oh good! You should have won."

"Can we play now?" Rickon turned to Father and stared at him with wide eyes. "Please?"

"We need to watch them all burn out," Mother said gently, and she pulled Rickon into her lap.

"Can I have some gelt at least?" Rickon asked.

Mother reached into the bag at her feet and tugged open the yellow plastic mesh and let Rickon fumble out some chocolate.

He ate one as Arya let out a whoop, her candle somehow having outpaced Robb’s, then he handed a coin to Bran, and smiled.

"Thank you, Rickon," Bran said, peeling back the golden foil.

Rickon kept smiling and he put another piece of chocolate into his mouth. 


End file.
